1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a technology of evaluating usability of a device.
2. Background Arts
A usability evaluation device and a method thereof, which are disclosed, e.g., in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-56771 already proposed by the present applicant, are know as this type of technology. This usability evaluation device evaluates usability of an object device by evaluating time till a user attains a target action in an object device such as ATM (Automatic Teller Machine), a ticket issuing/selling machine or a cellular phone, etc.
These object devices are structured to accomplish one object by performing, as their functions, a series of operations such as drawing cash, depositing the cash, purchasing a ticket, giving a phone call, receiving the phone call and so forth. Therefore, the usability evaluation device finally accomplished by sequentially measuring the time till each of the operations is completed.
Depending on the object device, however, the completion of the operation can not necessarily be judged distinctively. Namely, the object device of which the operation continuously proceeds, might have a case of being unable to distinctively identify the completion of the operation. Further, depending on an operation tool, there might be case where the completion of the operation can not necessarily be recognized distinctively.
For example, in the case of setting a temperature, time, a volume, tuning in on TV and radio, etc., by use of an up/down switch, there might be often an excess over a target position. This is a case in which if the temperature is desired to be set at 25 degrees, the temperature is changed up further to 26 degrees from 24 degrees and 25 degrees. In this case, after the target setting has been temporarily done, the setting further deviates. The prior arts did not have any contrivance about judging the case given above.
Moreover, if the object device to be evaluated includes a wide variety of operating components, the evaluation based on operations other than the operation upon a detection object can not be made simply by detecting only completion of a series of operations.
Moreover, according to the technology disclosed in the above Publication, the usability of the object device is evaluated by obtaining a ratio of operation time of a well-experienced user who operates the object device to operation time of a general user. Therefore, if the general user has a variety of attributes, those attributes can not be reflected in the evaluation of the object device.